Fantasy football 2015

Yes. I lose track of time even on my best days, and this time of year it gets worse.

 

Interestingly, as I look at my roster, my bench players all have "green" match ups (positive match ups), while all of my starters except Bortles will have red or yellow match ups. Yikes.

 

The team I'm playing for the Championship beat me twice during the regular season, but neither of us were very impressive (both matchups were 78-72). This is the lineup I'm leaning towards if OBJ's suspension is upheld. His RBs are formidable, but I have almost all "plus" matchups, while he has neutral or negative. Thoughts?

 

So what idiot does the projections on NFL.com's fantasy site? The Kansas City defense has scored in double digits in seven of its past eight games and has put up 14 or more in six of those games. Its average for those eight games is 15.25. This week, the Chefs play Cleveland at home. The Browns are second-worst in the league in fantasy points allowed to defenses -- opposing Ds have averaged 10.79 points per game, according to NFL.com.

So how many points have they projected for the KC defense? One-point-zero.

Really? I'll be extremely disappointed if I don't get at least 10 from that defense this week, and I'm thinking the ceiling is pretty damn high.

 

Pretty sure that job is outsourced to India.

 

Not sure about Hightower and Robinson in the same lineup. You're banking that two predominantly passing teams are going to each have big games from their running backs. Is it PPR?

 

Not PPR. You raise a good point, but options are limited. I could go Cameron Artis-Payne (CAR), but there aren't really any other workhorses out there.

 

Why not Dez? Bills have allowed a WR to score at least 10 points in all but two games in my non-PPR league this season and at least 12 points in each of the past four weeks. They've also allowed four receivers to go over 21 points.

 

You play both based on workloads. Hightower is going to see the majority of touches, gets goal-line carries and can catch balls out of the backfield. You play Robinson because he does damage as a checkdown receiver and if the Jaguars get down, he's gonna see all the carries.

Dez's success is tied to the man throwing him the ball. You play Dez because you believe Kellen Moore is good enough to get him the ball.
Part of me thinks that won't happen. I benched Dez last week because Cassell was so, so bad. Moore came out and immediately started targeting Dez so there's some hope, but I think in this situation you have to look at Dez as a boom or bust guy. Who he's playing with is more important than who he's playing against.

 

Fair point about Dez, however, when it comes to workloads, I'm not sure Robinson and Hightower are both going to receive enough touches to justify playing both. Both teams spread the ball around and I think this is going to be a vertical game favoring WRs like Cooks, Snead, Hurns and Allen Robinson. Also, Brees is heavily targeting Ben Watson, so again, that will cut into Hightower's chances out of the backfield.

Also, there are not many goal-line opportunities for Saints RBs, so I'm not sure I'd factor them in favor of Hightower. Saints RBs have scored only 8 TDs in 15 games on goal-line rushes (3 yards or less).

Moore may or may not be good enough to get Dez the ball. But the Cowboys are going to be relying on three players - Dez, McFadden and, to a much lesser extent, Witten. Dez will be targeted 8-12 times.

 

Hightower's touches will be related to how the Saints play. If they're in the lead, he'll get a ton. He had 28 carries in the win over Washington but 13 against Detroit where they fell behind big early.
Robinson had 14 carries both games he started. He only ran for 28 against Atlanta, but he had 10 targets and 8 catches. Against the Saints I think he's a great play because his versatility and he's the only guy there.
Dez's 8-12 targets are meaningless because you have to consider the throws aren't getting there. He had 5 catches on 8 targets for 104 and a TD vs. Philly, but other than that his numbers don't justify a WR1 or WR2 designation. Last week he had 9 targets but only 4 catches and if he doesn't score, it's a worthless fantasy day. Week before was 1 catch on 6 targets and the Washington game - where Romo got hurt late - he had 3 catches, 7 targets and 62 yards.
I want to play Dez, but if you have him and are in a final, isn't there a great chance you have someone better to replace him? If ODB stays suspended, I have Hopkins as my WR1 and my second spot is between Dez, John Brown and Tyler Lockette. Dez is a clear-cut third guy on that list.
More interesting is going to be Dez's value next year. His fantasy stock could drop and he could end up being this year's DeAndre Hopkins.

 

Is it certain Yeldon is out for this game?